Motley is the name of the crowd. One officer in the service of His Highness stalks down the market followed by a Hieland tail, proudly, as if he were lord of the three Arabias. Negroes who dislike the whip clear out like hawk-frightened pigeons. A yellow man, with short, thin beard, and high, meagre, and impassive features, he is well-dressed and gorgeously armed. Observe that he is ‘breek-less’: trowsers are ‘un-Arab,’ and unpopular as were the servile braccæ amongst the Romans. The legs, which, though spare are generally muscular and well-turned, appear beneath the upper coat, which falls to the knee. He adheres to the national sandals, thick soles of undyed leather, with coloured and spangled straps over the instep, whilst a narrow thong passes between the big toe and its neighbour. The foot-gear gives him that peculiar strut which is deemed dignified, and if he has a long walk before him—a very improbable contingency—he must remove his chaussure. I never yet saw a European who could wear the sandal without foot-chafing.

Right meek by the side of the Arab’s fierceness appears the Banyan, the local Jew. These men are Bhattias from Cutch in western India; unarmed burghers, with placid, satisfied countenances, and plump, sleek, rounded forms, suggesting the idea of happy, well-to-do cows. Such is the effect of a diet which embraces only bread, rice, and milk, sweetmeats, vegetables, and clarified butter. Their skins are smoother and their complexions are lighter than the Arabs’; their features are as high though by no means so thin. They wear the long mustachio, not the beard, and a Chinese pig-tail is allowed to spring from the poll of the carefully shaven head. These top-knots are folded, when the owners are full-dressed, under high turbans of spotted purple or crimson stuff edged with gold. The latter are complicated affairs, somewhat suggesting the oldest fashion of a bishop’s mitre; bound round in fine transverse plaits, not twisted like the Arabs’, and peaked in the centre above the forehead with a manner of horn. Their snowy cotton coats fit close to the neck, like collarless shirts; shawl-girt under the arms, they are short-waisted as the dresses of our grandmothers; the sleeves are tight and profusely wrinkled, being nearly double the needful length, and the immaculate loin-cloth displays the lower part of the thigh, leaving the leg bare. Their slippers of red leather are sharp-toed, with points turning upwards and backwards, somewhat as in the knightly days of Europe.

Another conspicuous type is the Baloch mercenary from Mekran or Maskat. A comely, brown man, with regular features, he is distinguished from the Arab by the silkiness and the superior length of his flowing beard, which is carefully anointed after being made glossy with henna and indigo. He adheres to his primitive matchlock, a barrel lengthened out to suit the weak powder in use, damascened with gold and silver, and fastened to the frail stock by more metal rings than the old French ‘Brown Bess’ ever had. The match is about double the thickness of our whipcord, and is wound in many a coil round the stalk or stock. A curved iron, about four inches long, and forked in the upper part to hold the igniter, plays in a groove cut lengthways through the wood and the trigger, a prolongation of the match-holder, guides the fire into the open priming-pan. When the match is not immediately wanted it is made fast to a batten under the breeching. (A parenthesis. Were I again to travel in wet tropical lands, I should take with me two flint-guns, which could, if necessary, be converted into matchlocks. Of course they would shoot slow, but they would not want caps, and they would prove serviceable when the percussion gun and the breech-loader would not.) This mercenary carries also two powder-gourds, one containing coarse material for loading, the other a finer article, English, if possible, for priming. He is never without flint, steel, and tinder; and disposed about his person are spare cartridges in reed cases. His sabre is of the Persian form; his dagger is straighter and handier than that of the Arab; and altogether his tools, like his demeanour, are those of a disciplined, or rather of a disciplinable, man.

The wildest and most picturesque figures are the half-breeds from the western shores of the Persian Gulf—light brown, meagre Ishmaels and Orsons, who look like bundles of fibre bound up in highly-dried human skin. Their unkempt elf-locks fall in mighty masses over unclean, saffron-stained shirts, which suggest the ‘night-gown’ of other days, and these are apparently the only articles of wear. Their straight, heavy swords hang ever ready by a strap passing over the left shoulder; their right hands rest lovingly upon the dagger-hafts, and their small round targes of boiled hippopotamus hide—one of the ‘industries’ of Zanzibar—apparently await immediate use. Leaning on their long matchlocks, they stand cross-legged, with the left foot planted to the right of the right, or vice versâ, and they prowl about like beasts of prey, as they are, eyeing the peaceful, busy crowd with a greedy cut-throat stare, or with the suspicious, side-long glance of a cat o’ mountain.

These barbarian ‘Gulf Arabs’ differ singularly from the muscular porters of Hazramaut, in whose Semitic blood there is a palpable African mixture. They hobble along in pairs, like the Hammals of Constantinople, carrying huge bales of goods and packs of hides suspended from a pole, ever chaunting the same monotonous grunt-song, and kicking out of the way the humped cows that are munching fruit and vegetables under the shadow of their worshippers, the Banyans. Add half a dozen pale-skinned ‘Khojahs,’ tricky-faced men with evil eyes, treacherous smiles, fit for the descendants of the ‘Assassins,’ straight, silky beards, forked after the fashion of ancient Rustam, and armed with Chinese umbrellas. Complete the group by throwing in a European—how ghastly appears his blanched face, and how frightful his tight garb!—stalking down the streets in the worst of tempers, and using his stick upon the mangy ‘pariah dogs’ and the naked shoulders of the ‘niggers’ that obstruct him. At times the Arabs, when their toes or heels are trampled upon, will turn and fiercely finger their daggers; but a fear which is by no means personal prevents their going further.

Such is the aristocracy of the land. As in all servile societies, every white man (i.e. non-negro) is his white neighbour’s equal; whilst the highest black man (i.e. servile) ranks below the lowest pale-face.

Far more novel to us is the slave population, male and female. What first strikes every stranger is the scrupulous politeness and the ceremonious earnestness of greetings when friends meet. The idea of standing in the broiling sun to dialogue as follows is not a little remarkable:

The fact is they are going about ‘Ku amkía,’ to salute their friends, and to waste time by running from house to house. Even freemen generally begin their mornings thus, and idle through the working hours.

The males tie, for only garb, a yard of cotton round the waist, and let it fall to the knees; bead necklaces and similar trash complete the costume. Like all negroes they will wear, if possible, the shock-head of wool, which is not pierceable by power of any sun; and they gradually unclothe down to the feet, which, requiring most defence, are the least defended—‘Fashion’ must account for the anomaly. To the initiated eye the tattoo distinguishes the vast confusion of races. The variety of national and tribal marks, the stars, raised lumps and scars, the beauty-slashes and carved patterns, further diversified by the effects of pelagra, psoris, and small-pox, is a Chinese puzzle to the new-comer. Domestic slaves, bearing their burdens on the head, not on the shoulder, are known by a comparatively civilized aspect. They copy their masters, and strangers remark that the countenance is cheerful and not destitute of intelligence. The Bozals, or freshly-trapped chattels, are far more original and interesting. See those Nyassa-men, with their teeth filed to represent the cat or the crocodile, chaffing some old Shylock, an Arab dealer in human flesh and blood; or those wild Uzegura-men, with patterned skins and lower incisors knocked out, like the Shilluks to the west of the Nile, scowling evilly, and muttering curses at the Nakhuda (skipper) from Súr, the professional kidnapper of their kind.